


Roguetale: Now

by Ink_Glitch



Series: RogueTale AU [2]
Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: AU, Alternate Universe - Original, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Backstory, Fluff, Gen, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-27
Updated: 2018-07-27
Packaged: 2019-06-17 03:53:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,643
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15452796
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ink_Glitch/pseuds/Ink_Glitch
Summary: The thoughts of three monsters concerning the skeleton brothers' life now vs their life before.There is very mild Sansby, and it can be read as romantic or platonic.





	1. Because I Can

Call it what you will. Maybe it IS lazy to nap and slack off like I often do. But honestly, that’s not why. It’s not my intent to be lazy. No, not at all. If my early life proves anything, it’s that I’m far from lazy. Papyrus surely doesn’t remember. He was barely six when we finally got off the streets. And he spent most of the day playing with Grillby anyway. And when Grillby left for Snowdin with his father, Papyrus was old enough to be in preschool. So I doubt he ever really noticed. Which is a good thing. I’m glad he never had to be weighed down by those burdens.  
It was a struggle though. Working every job I could find, earning enough money to keep paying for a small hotel room and for food, and clothes, and all the thing we needed, and trying to have extra stored away for emergencies and so sometimes I could do something nice for Paps, but still being done in time to pick him up from his afterschool clubs and starting late enough that I could drop him off every morning. Because Papyrus was all I had in the world, and there was no way I was going to be anything less than he needed, than he wanted, than he deserved.  
So lazy? Yea, that’s not really the right word. Even when we first moved to Snowdin, when I was 17 and had just gotten a job in the Royal Guard as a sentry, I had to keep it up, keep working as hard as I could. Take Papyrus to school, go to my station, work, patrol, pick Papyrus up from school, help him with his homework, listen to him talk about his day while I made dinner, didge his questions about if I had seen/fought a human if there had been news of one that day (because there was no way in heck that I could tell him that I helped the humans as best I could, not with the stories he grew up hearing and his goal of joining the guard someday as well), get him ready for bed, read him a story, stay up late to finish all the paperwork I did for extra pay so we could keep our little hut (we didn’t have our house yet, how could we? I barely made enough for what we had, which was better than a hotel room, but not by much), then go to bed, rinse, and repeat. For eight years.  
Thinking about it, I guess I wanted Papyrus to get the childhood I didn’t have. I don’t remember the first nine years of my life, and the rest of my life had been spent worrying. I had to keep him happy, keep him safe. He deserved that much, and far more. I don’t regret a single thing, and I’d do it again in a soul-beat, but it was hard. I won’t deny that.  
Grillby was fourteen when we moved, and I think he had started to understand, in the four years that we had been apart, that Paps and I… didn’t have a good life. So he helped us, in little ways. Small gifts of food, or old toys, or clothes were often presented to us by the cute green-tinted flame elemental. They were part of what helped us stay afloat.  
It wasn’t until Papyrus was sixteen and made it into the Royal Guard that I finally got to have a break. Because honestly? I may be stronger than him (a LOT stronger, if you want the truth), but he had more drive than I did, more energy, and more time, and within three months he was head sentry of Snowdin. And finally, finally, I didn’t have to worry anymore.  
With the money he made, along with what I had saved, we bought a bigger house, one with four whole rooms, two stories, and a basement. We had money to buy food and clothes and pay the bills and still have plenty left over.  
So once again, lazy isn’t it. I slack off, goof off, and nap whenever I want because I can. I don’t have to work constantly anymore. I can sleep when I’m tired, I can take the day off if I want. I can go visit Grillby’s restaurant, Grillby’s (What can I say, monsters just generally suck at naming things) if I want, and if that dork would let me, I could pay the tab I have. Because it’s not all my responsibility anymore. Sure, I still worry. I kinda break the law any time a human falls, and I hardly want my bosses, or Asgore forbid Papyrus, to find out. I worry about Papyrus, naturally, and I have plenty of smaller worries. But compared to life before? Things are perfect. And I couldn’t wish for anything in the world that could possible make me as happy as I am now. Because what could ever compare to having the weight of everything lifted from your shoulders?


	2. Why I Try

Sans might not think I remember. To be honest, I don’t remember much. He never really talks about our life in New Home, especially our life before I was six, which is the part I remember least. I… I think it’s hard for him. He hides his emotions really well. But I’m pretty sure that thinking about back then? It brings up bad memories. He always gets really quiet when it comes up. Sometimes for a few days.  
But I remember a bit. I remember Sans, mostly. Sans smiling as he picks me up from school, Sans helping me with homework, Sans standing me on a chair in our little hotel room, teaching me to make oatmeal in the microwave, because we didn’t have a stove. There’s Sans taking me to the Spider bakery as a treat on my birthdays, and Sans patching up chipped bones whenever I got hurt playing. Sans is just always there, taking care of me.  
I remember Grillby too, though more faintly. That’s probably because Sans says he left when I was four. But I have faint flashes of the two of us playing together. He was always patient with me, even though I’m six years younger than him.   
I know we didn’t have a great life back then, and that even if our life in Snowdin still wasn’t great at first, it was a lot better. I know it was a lot harder on Sans than it was on me. Of course it was! He spent his childhood taking care of me, keeping me safe and happy. He tries to keep that from me, too. I don’t think he wants me to feel guilty. The one time it came up, he told me, in no uncertain terms, that he would do it all over again in an instant, as many times as he had to.   
Still, I wish I had been older back then, able to take some of the weight off his shoulders. I remember more vividly our years in Snowdin. How tired Sans always looked. He tried to hide it, behind puns and jokes, and he never, ever hesitated to help me with whatever I wanted, never got mad, or snapped, or yelled, or scolded me. Not once.   
I may get on him about being lazy, but he and I? We both know I don’t mean it. He might not realise it, but I know how hard everything was for him. If he wants to be lazy now, goof off and skip work, spend time eating Dill Pickle Relish at Grillby’s (even if I just don’t understand the appeal, why not eat some actual food) and hanging out with him, even if it’s during work hours, I won’t stop him. He deserves it. He deserves every minute of it.  
Because Sans has always been there for me. I know that he stayed up way, way later that I did taking on extra work. I’d wake up at night sometimes, around midnight, or even two in the morning, and his light would be on, pen scratching away. And he was still up at six thirty with breakfast ready when I woke the next day, acting like he had all the energy in the world. I know that we were kept afloat by the gifts Grillby would bring us, and that Sans felt incredibly guilty that he couldn’t pay his friend back. So I won’t stop him from sleeping whenever the annoying dog he wants.  
And I think it’s my turn to repay him. That’s half the reason I wanted to join the Royal Guard in the first place. Because Sans shouldn’t have to do everything any more. It’s the reason I work so hard, got promoted so quickly. Because I saw the way Sans looked at the nice house on the edge of town, and how he was storing away every spare penny. He always spent his extra money on nice things for me. So it was my turn to repay the favor.  
And he was also the other half of the reason I wanted to join the Royal Guard. I may be very cool, but Sans is a thousand times cooler. If he joined the Royal guard, what could be a cooler goal? And he always called me ‘The Great and Powerful Papyrus’ when I showed him the new attacks I would learn. It made him proud of me, and I want him to be as proud of me as I am of him. So I will always work hard to be the best I can be, at everything I do.  
I’m no fool, I’ve heard what the other guard members say. I know Sans is far, far more powerful than me, more powerful that anyone save perhaps Asgore. But I’ve never seen him use that power, and I swear that I will do everything I can to make sure he never has to use it. Because he deserves so much more.   
That’s why I try so hard. Because I want him to feel free to relax, to not have to fight, to do what he wants. I want to keep the burden of everything he once carried off his shoulders forever. Because things have changed, and now it’s my turn to be the responsible one. My brother was all I had for so long, and I will never, ever forget that.  
So yea, I’m happy now, and I will be happy forever, as long as my brother is happy. Because I was able to lift his burden from his shoulders, let him know that I appreciate everything he did, everything gave up. And I will never, ever stop trying to show him how much it means to me. But I’m sure he already knows.


	3. I Could Now

I first met Sans and Papyrus when I was six. Sans was hanging around the street where my father’s food cart was, holding his little brother, still a baby back then. I loved being around babies, and they loved being around me (the still do, I think it’s how warm and bright my flames are), so I ran over to say hi. I don’t think Sans trusted me at first. No surprise. He didn’t even speak Common back then, only Handfont and Wingdings, so he hadn’t been able to communicate with anyone until that point.  
Luckily for me, my father knew Handfont (neither he nor I remember why though), and he had taught me some. So I became his teacher, teaching him about New Home and how to speak common. It was hard, as I barely spoke Handfont, and I was only six, so I was still grasping the complexities of Common, but we managed, somehow, so understand each other, and he was a fast learner.  
Later, when he got a job, I would watch Papyrus for him. Papyrus was still a tiny skeleton back then, a year and a half old. I didn’t understand why Sans had to work back then, because didn’t his parents take care of that, but I wasn’t going to complain about having a playmate. We had fun, when he was littler, I would teach him to speak, and we would play silly little games I made up as best we could. Later, when he could walk, we would play tag, hide and seek, and all kinds of little games like that. I had to slow down and go easy on Papyrus, but I didn’t mind. As I said, I like little kids just as much as they like me.  
I knew Sans and Papyrus had a hard life, but even by the time I was ten and my father and I moved to Snowdin I still didn’t fully grasp it. I didn’t understand that someone could not have a house, have parents. It wasn’t until I was fourteen and they moved to Snowdin as well that I fully understood. Because here Sans was, sixteen, paying the bills for a small, two room shack, off of a part-time sentry’s salary, all by himself. And when I understood…. I don’t even think I can describe how… how terrible I felt that I had never noticed.  
At that point I decided I would help out the two of them whenever I could. If Papyrus needed watching, I would volunteer. If I had anything I outgrew, or didn’t use anymore, it went to them. When I got a brand new green jacket from a distant relative who didn’t quite get the whole fire elemental thing, I gave it to Sans without hesitation(Despite being older than me and having reached as tall as he was going to get, he was only five foot, the same height I was at that point [I was 16]). I made sure they got the extra food at the end of the night from my father’s restaurant.  
I was glad I could help them in some small ways. I kept doing everything I could for them. When I was nineteen, my father retired and turned the restaurant over to me, which I renamed it Grillby’s (Hey, it may not be creative, but before that it was just called ‘Grill.’). It was at that point that life finally got better for the skeleton brothers. Papyrus, now sixteen, finally got a job as a member of the Royal Guard, just like his brother. Within three months he got promoted.  
I remember very clearly, because that evening Sans came in to my bar just as I was closing up (though he never ordered anything, I made sure he knew he was allowed in whenever he needed to talk, that I would always take a break for him), and he was in tears. He broke down crying at the bar counter. He was sobbing about how happy he was. Because the weight was off his shoulders. He didn’t have to do everything anymore. I don’t think I had ever seen him so happy in his life.  
I brought him a hotdog, with extra relish (I remembered it was his favorite from long ago in New Home), and though I wasn’t quite sure what to do, I sat across from him, and just let him talk and cry. When he was done, and had composed himself (it took a few hours, but I didn’t care), he tried to pull out some gold to pay, but I told him I’d put it on a tab.  
Because I didn’t know how much he was struggling when we first met. I wasn’t able to help him. But I could now, and I was never going to make him pay for food from my restaurant. Him or his brother. They had a hard life. So now, I was going to do everything I could to keep their life easy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> -Character Ages:  
> Sans: 26  
> Grillby: 23  
> Papyrus: 17
> 
> -Ok, so yes, there are hints of Sansby in this. It can be read as platonic or romantic, but I am thinking of it as romantic. I am normally a Soriel shipper, its one of my OTPs, but in Roguetale, it gets kinda weird. You see, bossmonsters only age physically while they have living children once they reach twenty. So Tori has Asriel, but then he dies at age 8, making her twenty eight. Which may seem fine. Until you realise that at the time this story takes place, she has been twenty-eight for ~180 YEARS. So she's been alive 208 years. You see why it gets weird? Also, she is still married to Asgore, even though she basically hates him, but she doesn't feel like she can run away like original Toriel does. So yea.
> 
> -Since it's been 180+ years, no one remembers anything about Chara. They are basically a myth, and no one really knows anymore the true story of The Light Of The Underground, save Flowey, Toriel, and Asgore
> 
> -Sans in RogueTale loves Dill Pickle Relish instead of ketchup, partly because I love Dill Pickle Relish XD
> 
> -This story is ~2600 words, and was all written at once.
> 
> -It is a little rambly and repetative, but that is on purpose. It's thoughts.
> 
> -This takes place 1.75 years after Papyrus becomes the head sentry of Snowdin. There have been six children so far, minus Chara, the last when he was fourteen. Frisk is next.


End file.
